I didn't think my parents could keep up the chaotic pace we had been keeping all of September, boy was I wrong. Instead of slowing down, they took the chaos to a new level. After a 16 hour road trip from GP & Gigi's house to San Francisco (through the middle of the night) we spent Monday visiting friends all over the bay area. We started with one of Noni's dearest friends, Kathy Turnbeaugh, who was watching her grandson Brayden (14 months). For lunch we met up with Brayden's parents Amber and Brenden (Amber and Mom have been friends since they were my age). We headed south after lunch and had cocktail hour with a college friend of Mom & Dad's. She had two little ones for me to play with so that was a great stop. Then we headed to Santa Cruz to visit one of Daddy's best friends from college. Joey and Heidi had a little boy for me to talk to who was younger than me, but not much smaller. He was adorable--the biggest cheeks I've ever seen. His picture below doesn't do them justice. We were working on almost 30 hours of living out of the car, so we had to say goodbye to the Allen's and make our last stop of the day. We ended up with one of mom's best friends from college for the night. That was Monday!! Fortunately for everyone's sake, Monday was the craziest day of the week. We ended up spending two nights with Mike, Autumn, Luke, Kendall, & Gianna in Salinas and then driving to Corbett, Laura & Hayley's in Camarillo on Wednesday. We got to spend two nights there which seems taylormade for us. Mom played Nertz with Mrs. Lara, Dad golfed with Mr. Corbett and Hayley and I were able to play with each other. Friday night we switched back to visiting some of Dad's friends from college. We stayed with Jon & Amoreena, and they hosted the Erickson's who brought their 5 day old son Daniel. He was too little for me to play with, but I did get to play with their daughter Bella. Saturday afternoon we drove further south to see more friends. We stayed the night with Steve, Sara, Nick, Jake & Sasha in San Juan. Starr & her boyfriend Brian visited too Saturday night. That stop was fun because it felt a lot like our summer rental. Sunday we got up and had breakfast and hit the road again. Since we had started within hours of the Canadian border the previous Sunday and were now within hours of the Mexician border, we figured we would turn left and head for home (besides, mom had to work at Starbucks at 4am Monday morning!). The scenery got a little boring and I was starting to get car seat sores, but I pulled it together because I knew at the end of the this leg of our trip was Cousin Camden and Cousin Ashton. We did finally make it home. I got more hugs and kisses than I remember from not only Cousin Camden but all my family. What a trip. Approxiametly 1800 miles & 171 hours from departure from GP & Gigi's to arrival at home. We spent the night in five differnt places (including the car). We saw 32 beloved friends, two who were younger than me! And it all ended with a wonderful welcome home from our Tucson family. 30 days of chaos; We visited friends or family in 10 different cities all over the West Coast, spent the night in 11 different places, traveled over 2000 miles and watched the Huskies win their first football game in 16 tries. It can't get any crazier than that can it?
Part of my long Monday was spent meeting Josiah Allen.
I ended the longest Monday of my life by meeting three new friends in Salinas, near Monterey, near 17-mile drive, near a couple special golf courses.
This is my friend Mr. Corbett. He is dressed up because my friend Hayley was teaching me how to dress up a dad with cute accessories.
Friday night I met Bella and Daniel. Daniel was five days old. He was tiny!
We had one final stop before home. Mom use to babysit these kids when they were my age. Practice makes perfect, and my mom is just that!
No comments:
Post a Comment